Social Media Doesn’t Grow in Fenced Gardens

We’ve all been there-we click on a link in the hopes of getting some interesting or relevant information only to be greeted with a page requiring us to supply our name, e-mail address, phone number, birthday, address, and yet another password that we won’t remember because it has to be 268 characters long. I don’t know about you, but unless it is something I really want to read, I click the back button and move on.

Or how about the “free trial” that requires you to enter your credit card information and if you don’t cancel within 30 days, they’ll begin charging you?

Traditional marketing people love these types of promotions, and, like 99% of traditional marketing tactics, they don’t work with social media. All a traditional marketer wants is your contact information (or even better, your credit card information) so they can continue to push their message at you. They aren’t really interested in sharing something of relevance with you-they are looking to build their database.

Instead, with social media, companies need to use a pull strategy-which means having to actually give something away without expecting something in return. By doing so, you plant the seed so when your audience is moving from the consideration to purchase stage, your company is already top-of-mind because you’ve provided them something of value in the past without any strings attached.

Two things to remember, though, when planting your social media garden: 

1. Plants don’t grow overnight.
2. If you don’t take care of them, they’re going to die.

 So don’t get impatient and don’t expect it to be easy. Just because social media is “free” doesn’t mean it doesn’t take a lot of work.

Tags: maples communications, marketing, public relations, social media, traditional